


What Just Happened?

by MissChrisDaae



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-02
Updated: 2019-05-02
Packaged: 2020-02-15 20:30:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18676891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissChrisDaae/pseuds/MissChrisDaae
Summary: Jane's visit to Asgard is so freaking weird.SPOILERS. SPOILERS. ENDGAME SPOILERS.THOU HAST BEEN WARNED.[Short little drabble of sorts about a logic hole that was bugging me.]





	What Just Happened?

That was a raccoon.

A raccoon had stuck her with a syringe and somehow just  _pulled_ the Aether out of her. The soldiers—  _Einherjar_ — were chasing it now, but she was just trying to wrap her mind around what had happened. Did Asgard even  _have_ raccoons? Or was there just an alien species that happened to look like Earth raccoons?

As Jane sank down on the bed, trying to wrap her head around it, she felt a shift in the air, like the discharge after a bolt of lightning. And suddenly, Steve Rogers,  _Captain America,_  was standing in front of her in some bizarre new suit that retracted away from his body, seemingly into nowhere. "Okay, should I be thinking this is a dream now?" Jane asked bluntly.

"If that's gonna make things easier for you," he suggested awkwardly. "It's... nice to see you again, Jane."

It was the  _again_ that made things click. She'd seen Steve Rogers on TV a few times, but they'd never met face to face. And yet he was talking like he knew her. "Oh, my  _God,_ this is time travel," she all but squealed, shooting to her feet and really taking a look at him. He had some kind of briefcase in one hand, and in the other... "Is that  _Mjolnir?_  I have so many questions about the quantum mechanics of all of this, but then if you tell me, I assume that upends the space-time continuum, and we don't want that."

Steve opened his mouth, then closed it, shaking his head. "I almost forgot how smart you are. It's been a really long time."

"I'll choose to take that as a compliment." Her brain was working overtime to reconcile everything that was happening. "So, if the raccoon took the Aether out of me," she paused, her eyes going to the briefcase. "You're here to put it back in me."

"Yeah."

"There's no other way? It's _really_ not fun having that thing inside me," Jane mumbled, rubbing her hands together nervously.

"Space-time continuum," he reminded her, awkwardly setting down the hammer. "Is it okay if I leave this here?"

"Um, yeah, I guess so," she agreed weakly. "I mean, if Thor— my Thor, I mean— needs it, he can summon it."

"I'm really sorry that I have to do this, Jane."

"I mean, if this is the way it has to be, I can't really argue against it." she sighed, sitting back down on the bed. "You're the one from the future. You know what has to happen."

Steve opened the briefcase and took out a glowing red stone. "This is gonna have to happen real fast."

"That's not the Aether."

"It kind of is. It's complicated," he admitted. "Basically, this was  _in_ the Aether, and I'm going to have to put it back inside, then get out of here real quick—"

"So that it has nowhere to go except me," Jane finished. "I get it."

"Again, I'm really sorry."

"It's okay. We can have a laugh about this when you go back to the future." Steve let out a small ' _ha_ ,' like he was sharing an inside joke with himself. Jane frowned. "You  _are_ going back, aren't you? Staying here would create a divergent parallel reality. You would probably never get back home."

"Don't worry about me, Jane, I'll be fine," he promised, pressing the gem between his hands so that Jane could only see a bit of the red glow peeking out between his fingers. "Okay, are you ready?"

"As I'll ever be." She shifted nervously, watching as he slowly parted his fingers and the familiar red-black ooze of the Aether started to take form around the gem. "Good luck, Steve."

"You too, Jane." He hit a button on his wrist she hadn't seen before and the weird suit came back around him as he started shrinking down into nothingness. Jane would've moved closer to get a better look, but the Aether surged forward, snaking its way back under her skin and flinging her against the wall.

"Owww," she groaned as the wooziness began to set back in.

"Jane Foster?" One of the guards who had stayed behind poked his head into the room.

"You can... tell your friends to stop looking for the thing that poked me," she said, running her hand over her forearm just as Odin had done earlier, so that the guard could see the alien parasite bubbling inside her. "Nothing's changed."

"But, you said... And the creature..."

"Yeah, I know, but my mind must have been playing tricks on me," she lied. "No need to keep looking for the Aether, it's right here."

"But the rabbit..."

"Is not a problem," Jane cut him off without bothering to correct him on the terminology. "Ask Heimdall if you don't believe me." That seemed to be enough for the guard, who shuffled back to his post by the door. Jane pulled the blanket from her bed and wrapped it around her shoulders, head out to the balcony to take a look at Asgard while she digested what had just happened.

Time travel was going to be plausible at some point in the future. Moreover, it was going to be necessary. So was the Aether, or rather, the gem inside it.

She needed to get dressed and do some exploring. In a place as big and old as Asgard, there had to be answers hiding somewhere, and she was not going to sit and wait for the Aether to suck her life away.

Turning back, she took a look at Mjolnir, sitting on the floor. "Can you, like, go back to wherever Thor was keeping you?" she asked, bending down to the weapon's level, and running her fingers along the handle. The hammer, somewhat obviously, did not respond and she sighed, getting a firmer grip on it with the intent using it for support while sitting down. Instead, the hammer moved, coming up easily in her hand.

Jane blinked twice in surprise. That...was not what she expected.

It was lighter than she'd thought.

"I think we better not tell Thor about this," she informed the weapon, giving it a little spin like she'd seen Thor do, then letting go. "Hurry back to him."

The hammer took off, disappearing into the Asgardian skyline, and leaving Jane alone with a cosmic entity in her body and questions in her mind.


End file.
